Talk:Mount Merapi

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This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Mount Merapi article.
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[edit] Violent Explosion?

"On May 15, a violent erruption finally occured, blowing the cap off Mount Merapi. Lava continues to flow following the main erruption."

I've seen stories about the eruptions getting steadily bigger, but nothing like this. Can anyone confirm? Dymero 00:49, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

I feel bad about those poor people that might. So sad... IThink4u 01:09, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
I'm hoping that all will heed the evacuation order. I've read that some haven't. Anyway, I see that the section was modified, so I guess my question was answered. --Dymero 01:43, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

I added some text ealier this evening which was removed: On May 15, deadly heat clouds containing toxic gases started tumbling down the side of the mountain.

Wetman (rv psychic predition by User:Brat32)

I don't appreciate sarcasm - it's poor communication. I'm new to this and perhaps I did not add the source correctly - I had several reliable sources e.g. http://www.antara.co.id/en/seenws/?id=12684

Brat32

With an event like this it's best to be pretty conservative in adding to an article. There will be constant reports of activity, some will be accurate, others will not. It doesn't hurt to wait to see if reports are confirmed - after all, we're not trying to be a news service. In this case, the deadly 'heat clouds' are presumably pyroclastic flows - I'd be wary of reports that invent their own volcanic terminology! Worldtraveller 08:33, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
The conservativeness of this article hmmm. There are a whole range of local cultural features that really should be in this article to counter the crap that news bureaus pickup and never get corrected on. In the 1930's the London Times articles about the eruptions focused on the dutch/european casualties, and more or less ignored the hundreds of locals killed - now in 2006 the wiki persons who lurk to keep the article clean, and leave out the socio-cultural aspects of what is a substantially symbolic and significant location in the landscape of the people who live around the volcano, maybe a separate article on volcanoes in java should be created that is not neat and "scientific" but which realises the issue of volcanoes in the minds of the javanese!!!!!!!124.178.35.222 11:48, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
I live in Perth, Western Australia. Will we be getting some awesome Krakatoa-style sunsets resulting from this, or is it too small? Battle Ape 13:11, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
Well you never know - should the eruption become a really big one, eject say 2 or more km³ of ash and inject a lot into the stratosphere, it could create global effects. But such eruptions are rare and no-one can possibly say whether this one will become one. Worldtraveller 13:30, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
If such thing happen I think Yogyakarta will be bury in lava and lahars, isn't it? Why I don't get such sunset here in Bandung?Aditthegrat 15:49, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

The article claims a death toll of 9000 but the news reports claim no more than 5000. --168.215.251.1 02:33, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia main page info about eruption exagerated

I have been following the probable impending eruption of Merapi on the BBC news, and when I saw on the Wikipedia main page, today (16th May) that "Mount Merapi (pictured), a volcano in Central Java, Indonesia, erupts." I thought that it had finally blown. In fact, when I checked the latest facts from the BBC website it is in fact the opposite, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4985086.stm.

Perhaps there are those that would argue that the current activity qualifies as "erupts", but I think there is a big difference qualitatively and quantatively between the activity of Merapi at the moment and the activity that we all anticipate will occur shortly.

I'm rather disappointed with Wikipedia for thus misreporting on the main page such things, and would (if I could edit the main page), change the wording to indicate more accurately the actual activity currently occuring. I would ask anyone with the authority to make the main page clearer to do so.

Brusselsshrek 11:17, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunately the media is misreporting it. When lava is flowing from a volcano, it is certainly an eruption, but some sections of the media are wrongly giving the impression that only when there's a big explosion will it be an eruption. Anyway, I tweaked the entry on the main page slightly. Worldtraveller 11:36, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
Thanks Worldtraveller! Brusselsshrek 14:11, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Misuse of Merapi as an anti-nuclear news issue

A number of Australian newspapers are running a combined story on the current Merapi activity along with the Suharto era planned Gunung Muria Nuclear Power Station proposal which has had a go-ahead by the current administration (which will no doubt create fear in Australia if anything ever went wrong, but totally ignores the approximately 50 million plus indonesian who would be in range of the Muria station well before any poor distant Australians) SatuSuro 15:37, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm a lazy bastard that won't do a search. So, any link to the news report? __earth (Talk) 15:49, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Muslim Ruler at 1006?

A very large eruption in 1006 covered all of central Java with ash. The volcanic devastation is believed to have led to the collapse of the Hindu Kingdom of Mataram, and the ensuing power vacuum allowed Muslims to become the rulers of Java.

I've deleted this. The power in Java just shifted to eastern Java from Kingdom of Mataram to Kediri. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aditthegrat (talk • contribs)

This is from Decker and Decker, cited in the references, so I've restored it. Worldtraveller 10:43, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
The etymology of this quote quite possibly emanates from the work of Hinloopen van Labberton (or somebody sounding like that) from trawling palace archive reccords either in the 1920's or 1930's in Yogyakarta and Surakarta and making interpolations from javanese dating systems (problematic enough in itself), and since then the stories have been claims for Merapi, and other reasons. There is no proof in any way as to the reasons for the shift, assertions for an exact date and specific shift are simply conjecture.

Best way to go to is to disclaim such unprovable items and defer to the pre-eminent singaporean archaeologist John Miksic on page 63 of 'Indonesian Heritage: Ancient History' 1996 .."The historical record of central Java suddenly falls silent in 919 a.d.. By 928 a.d. the javanese rulers were based in east java.....theories for the kingdom's eastward move range from volcanic eruptions, to epidemics, to attacks from Sriwijaya, but no evidence has yet confirmed or refuted any of these explanations".

From Miksic and others, the aeitology of the move of power from central java to east java is so open to conjecture and lacking in hard evidence it deserves careful thought as to how to explain something we really know nothing about. Merapi eruption dates in the first millenia c.e. are not necessarily a hard fact.

Anyone making claims for an exact date of the eruption need more than just a secondary source, as I have suggested that if they derive from dutch colonial writers, dating systems are suspect. Also if any volcanology source cites 1006, that in itself is not good enough, unless dating has been done on ejectaa or strata - due to the nature of the 'derivative' use of unverifiable sources.SatuSuro 13:50, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Actually I'm not objected entire sentence. I'm objected about muslim ruler at that year. Majapahit are rule Java about 1293-1500 and they were Hindu kingdom. Maybe there are several muslim at the palace family, but they were not ruler. The rise of muslim influence is about thirteenth century. That's all my opinion.Aditthegrat 19:05, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
If this is indeed a good article, it should have neither the 1006 date or the conjecture about the shift of power without either careful provisos about being speculative, otherwise some very good supporting evidence flagged. I have pointed to what miksic wrote oin 1996, if someone has a better source, please place the good work up for us to see!SatuSuro 13:36, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Destructive potential

This article needs a clear statement conveying just how bad a big blow of Merapi would be (I'd do it myself but I'm no authority). If the expected Big One comes, will it be another Krakatoa?; will the ash cover make summer feel like autumn in the western hemiphere?... that sort of thing. Are these potentials even known? JDG 00:48, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

It's really impossible to predict, and Wikipedia is not a crystal ball. The size of any upcoming eruption can only be guessed at in the broadest terms, and volcanoes generally defy prediction. Merapi could stop erupting tomorrow, or it could undergo an enormous eruption - just no telling really. Worldtraveller 01:27, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
Really? I find that surprising. I mean, one always hears things like "...and Mt. Etna is X times more powerful than Vesuvius" and "Tambora was a world-record explosion waiting to happen". These sorts of comments seem to presuppose the validity of pre-knowledge of a given latent volcano's destructive potential. JDG 19:11, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
I suspect statements like that are not coming from volcanologists! Some eruptions happen without any precursors - such as that at Galeras in 1993, which killed six volcanologists. Some far exceed what was anticipated from the precursors, like the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens. Others pretty much live up to expectations - Mount Pinatubo for example - but they are rare and luck plays a huge part. Other volcanoes seem to be building to a climax and then stop. This happened at Rabaul in 1983, when the caldera floor rose by a metre and seismic activity shot up, but no eruption occurred. All you can really say in very general terms is that eruptions on the ring of fire are explosive, and somewhere along the ring at some point another Krakatoa-sized eruption will occur. On a much longer timescale, a Toba-sized eruption will occur. But when, and where, no-one knows. Worldtraveller 19:23, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
I don't mean to contradict you, World (you're obviously an authority), but what do you make of the statements of "Subandriyo, a chief geologist at the volcano office in Yogyakarta", who is paraphrased as saying, "even a strong eruption from the 2,914-meter (9,616-foot) [Mount Merapi] would still be less powerful than other volcanic activity in the region such as Mount Galungung in West Java and Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines. In a scale of 1 to 10, a major Merapi eruption would be at around three." This is from [1]... So this guy at least seems to think he can judge max blast potential just by knowing the characteristics of the brooding mount... JDG 19:54, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
Well, volcanologists are always, always under pressure to make a prediction. His prediction is really very cautious - Pinatubo was the largest eruption for 80 years so saying it won't be as large as that is pretty safe! But you just never know... Worldtraveller 20:51, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Going back to the JDG original request for a big bad blow conjuecture, is technically impossible, and the answer is a very clear NO. If the article was as good as it claims to be, then the physical outlline of the details of the very large explosion of the older form of Merapi (which can be found in Van Bemmelen's work..) shows that the very worse case scenario could be going back to what that particular explosion did - literally blow everything out to across to Muntilan, to the west and south west to sleman, and very close to the edges of Yogyakarta. It would be a toba in that sense. But to re-paraphrase what world is pointing out - any geologist who knows about Toba and its history knows the potential lies within the statistical range (an event that might be expected within a 10,000 year probability in other words) , so that any quote from a local vulcanologist about the volcano must be compared and predicated from the record of the last two hundred years events which are sufficiently dated.. (sic 1007, or should that be 1066, hmm...) and the behaviours of the volcano in that time.

Anyone who knows nothing about the history of the eruption history should be in reality guided to (a) van bemmelens detective work on the earlier volcano that did the equivalent of a massive event at some stage in the past (b) recent ie not longer than 200 year range of eruptive events. The patterns of behaviour within the recent eruptive record have shown the lava dome building up, collapsing, the eruption - and also a fairly predictable pattern (excepting for directions, as south west has been the most common direction of the last 80 years) But as world points out the vitally important when and where no-one knows.. One of the problems for a decade volcano like merapi is that the amount of attention from volcanolgists over the last thirty years has been immense, and with the recent level of monitoring utilising fairly sophisticated technology - is that the problem for the common person accessing wiki would want to think that all the foreign volcanogists who have flown in over this time would have a better go at guessing... sorry JDG it dosnt work that way, what with the separate earthquake and the merapi event, we could have a toba event tommorrow ( I hope to god it dosnt as the loss of life would exclipse the tsunami, but there's no guarantee)... all the money spent on monitoring and modelling merapi behaviour gives no one a license for prediction beyond the sun coming up tommorow. Oh well folks, pray to the god of merapi that he/she/it wants to go back to sleep..SatuSuro 09:23, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the answers, World and SatuSuro. I have no doubt all you are saying is so. But what I've been trying to focus on here is not the when and where, or even the how big—I've just been trying to nail down what the biggest, most destructive eruption of Merapi would be like, whether it happens today or 400,000 years from now. Can volcanologists look at a mountain, tally up its size, the likely capacity of its internal chambers, its "taproot" to the molten layer and whatever other physical parameters might be relevant, and say "the absolute worst explosion from Merapi would release X kinetic energy and X quantity of ash." Subandriyo of the Yogyakarta office appears to be making just such a statement when he says Merapi, in an all-out blow, would not exceed "a three". Is that to be taken seriously? JDG 22:26, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Ok, you get 11 out of 9 for persistence. subandriyo is no doubt working from the very limited understanding which has been gained from the huge amount of money spent by the indonesian, french, german and other volcanologists and their sponsoring institutions to understand the "small cycle" which merapi has exhibited over the last hundred years or so. It is highly unlikely that any volcano has ever been assessed in terms that you mention, most of volcanic understanding is de facto, or otherwise broadly statistical (once every 10,000 years likely to have another tambora or toba etc etc). Imagination and statistics might be invoked when looking at the older merapi and its outer edges, but it is very unlikely that any current understanding of what is happening below would be sufficient to give indication if a toba like event was to happen, imho. However if world or someone else can come up with refs that show that models can be invoked to predict volume and or intensity - bring em on! But to nail down how big Merapi could go - the earlier volcano was very big, and it blew itself out, then the younger one started up again, and so on, similar to the krakatoa process... one can only guess, i guess...  :) SatuSuro 00:43, 30 May 2006 (UTC) It's all a bit like watching gollum melt in the end of the lord of rings movie - you'll never know unless you're there - and it will be the end anyway!

[edit] Last Map in external links

Although still in, the last map referred to is innacurate and should not be taken literally, place names adjacent to Merapi appear to be inserted without consistency. No mention of Muntilan, Kaliurang or Selo anywhere (at least the provincial boundary is not as widely out as the map put into the article!). A very good indication of where the map is the Yogya - Magelang railway line still inserted on map, it has been removed in most places and has been out of use for decades! Be very careful when inserting any maps of the region, very few are in any way accurate! They should always be inserted with disclaimers/provisos "This map has errors and should not be used for any purpose other than... " etc SatuSuro 05:37, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Constant Vandalism

There is a need for a sys op to keep tags of this art as the vandalism is too constant for an ave edit person!!!SatuSuro 13:35, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Delisted GA

This artcile has been delist for a number of reason include incomplete information about the volcanoes affect on the population including culturally, and instability due to the current eruptions and the changes being caused by the current events Gnangarra 16:08, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Caution

Archaeologists with extensive experience in Java and southeast asia do not accept the "precision" of the claims for the "1006" eruption and its affect upon the region. The claims do not reflect rigorous scholarship, as their is insufficient evidence to date for the claims. As a result, and to improve the quality of this article, anyone re-editing the added cautions should note any claims of accuracy about events prior to the 1600's should come up with some very good refs and cite them clearly SatuSuro 13:34, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Trivia

I removed this from the article - WP:AVTRIV. It could be integrated into the main text somewhere maybe. 81.178.193.145 08:53, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

The infamous high temperature volcanic gas that is usually unloaded during mount Merapi's increasing volcanic activity is known locally as "Wedhus Gembel", which is translated as Shaggy Goat in English. [1]